WOW.... This from Beren Cross... Too much tinkering When Robin Koch found himself unable to continue with the head injury he sustained, there were a plethora of avenues Bielsa could have gone down with his replacement. Bring Raphinha on, push Daniel James into attack, drop Rodrigo back into midfield and have Adam Forshaw in the defensive midfielder slot. Bring Tyler Roberts or Gelhardt on, push Rodrigo back into midfield and have Forshaw in the deeper slot. Bring Jamie Shackleton on and push Forshaw into the defensive midfielder role. Instead, it was Junior Firpo who came on. Stuart Dallas would move into midfield and Forshaw would drop into the defensive hole. No, nothing that simple or straightforward. Bielsa interrupted Dallas’s rhythm and put him to right-back. Then he interrupted Luke Ayling’s rhythm and pushed him into central defence. Then he interrupted Diego Llorente’s rhythm and shuffled him from the right to the left of the centre. Then he interrupted Pascal Struijk’s rhythm and pushed him forwards into the defensive hole. Hindsight makes these assessments more straightforward and evidently, based on the options above, there would have been interruptions of some kind however Bielsa replaced Koch. There absolutely was a sound argument for not interfering with Forshaw, Mateusz Klich and Rodrigo’s central axis. They were playing well. The defence was performing well too, however, and in bringing on Firpo, Bielsa didn’t even take the most logical route we expected. He moved every piece of his five-man defensive unit for one substitution. This is a game of opinions, of course, but the experiment with Koch as a defensive midfielder when Forshaw is available is one thing. Trying Struijk in there ahead of the former Middlesbrough man is quite another.
Afternoon all, Pretty glum on here as usual. No one expected anything from the game, we got nothing from the game but actually in large parts of the game matched a near billion pound squad. All four goals can linked to individual errors of some form. If we had played terrible and lost then fair enough you all go off and drink the cool aid together. We played reasonably well but could not compete with a squad which is, sadly, largely better than ours man for man. If we had been rubbish as we were against Everton then I may join in more with the pessimism but, and this despite their being some points raised today I agree with, I wills we have that fight we will OK as there are a lot worse teams than we are.
Leeds are the 13th team to have conceded 50 or more goals after 24 games in a PL season. Of the previous 12, all but one team have been relegated.
The five teams below us for starters and Brentford above who are plunging faster than Katie prices knickers. I keep banging on about the points swing needed for just the bottom three to overtake us let alone the others. When that swing looks like it might actually be going against us then I'll worry. We have not won in three and during that run the bottom three managed to win two games between them
When our teams performances get you down you always have to remember there is always somebody with worse problems ..... https://www.bbc.com/sport/winter-olympics/60466907
Not by missing the number of chances that we do on too many occasions. Players like harrison should not be at this club. In loan fees and signing fee he has cost the most of any player in this squad. Yet he does nothing nearly every game and missed a sitter. James wasted another chance as well. Rodrigos goal was a fluke scored by the wind. Why have we so many wingers but no midfield or proven striker to call on. Who the hell is running this club?. Liverpool up next and we play like that again another thrashing. Fifty goals conceded is pathetic and since new year we needed to change tactics to suit the opposition. Bielsa has never won feck all of note. Well there you are and you know what i am not even bothered about losing anymore. I just know we need a total rebuild or we will go down this season or next. As a footnote if they all ran as hard as dan james we may yet escape.
To all of you Bielsa out folks, who do you want in? Sensible answers only please. I do not want Bielsa to leave, he has done great things and brought us a unique style of play. We do not have a billion pound squad, it obviously needs strengthening in the summer. I do not think we will go down, we can beat anyone on our day. For all of you wanting massive change, be careful what you wish for. I would hate to see us playing turgid football and parking the bus every week and trying to nick a point. MOT.
